A refrigerator is provided with a valve drive device which distributes common refrigerant (fluid) to a plurality of compartments for cooling the respective compartments. The valve drive device includes a valve seat plate 13′ through which an inflow port 13c for the refrigerant and outflow ports 13a′, 13b′ for the refrigerant pass in its thickness direction, a sealing case 19 which covers on the front face side of the valve seat plate 13′, and a valve element 30′ which is integrated with a gear 36′ and slides on the surface of the valve seat plate 13′ to open or close the outflow ports 13a′, 13b′ as shown in FIGS. 6(A) and 6(B). Further, a rotor 15′ and the valve element 30′ are respectively rotatably supported by a rotor support shaft 18 and a valve element support shaft 35′ which are fixed in the valve seat plate 13′ (see, for example, Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2003-21254).
The gear 36′ engages with a pinion 15e of the rotor 15′ and is rotated around the valve element support shaft 35′ with the rotation of the rotor 15′. Therefore, the opening/closing of the outflow ports 13a′, 13b′ can be controlled by changing angular position of the valve element 30′ (area as shown by the oblique lines in FIG. 6(B)).
In the valve drive device constructed as described above, the opening/closing of the outflow ports 13a′, 13b′ is required to be accurately performed and thus it is necessary to accurately grasp the position of the valve element 30′. Therefore, conventionally, protruding parts 32 are formed in the gear 36′ which is integrally formed with the valve element 30′ as shown in FIG. 6(B). The protruding part 32 abuts with a vicinity portion of the pinion 15e of the rotor 15′ and this position where the rotation is restricted is detected as a home position and the reset of position of the valve element 30′ is performed. FIG. 6(B) shows the state that the protruding part 32 of the left side gear 36′ abuts with the vicinity portion of the pinion 15e. 
However, recently, refrigerators have been required to be silent and thus its collision noise becomes a problem which is generated at the moment when the protruding part 32 abuts with the vicinity portion of the pinion 15e at the home position. Further, in order to perform the return to the home position of the protruding part 32, it is necessary to continue energization for a while after the protruding part 32 has abutted with the vicinity portion of the pinion 15e. Especially, when a stepping motor is used as a driving source, collision noise which is generated by the protruding part 32 intermittently colliding with the vicinity portion of the pinion 15e has continued during the locked state after the protruding part 32 has abutted with the vicinity portion of the pinion 15e. 